The 2004 presidential election would be a significant time for
Americans to turn around the country's image in the eyes of the world
over the issue of the Iraqi war, United States human right advocate
Jesse Jackson said yesterday.

Mr
Jackson, former assistant to Martin Luther King Jr and two-time
Democrat presidential candidate, said the election next year was not
just about choosing a new leader but also changing the direction and
priority of the American administration.

''I don't like the US being isolated like it is now. We deserve better than this,'' he said.

Mr
Jackson predicted Mr Bush would face a similar dilemma as his father
over the war issue which would come up in the presidential debates.

''We
can beat George W Bush again and this time we must revise the sense of
democratic process,'' he said in his keynote speech on the US after the
war on Iraq.

Mr Jackson said the
Bush administration went to war with no real interest in liberalising
the Iraqi people but for payback, oil and destroying Saddam Hussein.

He
said the administration did not choose the right approach with its
decision to go into war alone and choosing violence over peace.